How do people become homeless? -- Answer #62

How do people become homeless? – Answer #62
Performing the routine of everyday life, somehow. Not hearing others, the internal conversation (“Why?”) too loud. Enthusiasm evaporated. Looking absently at people, not really recognizing their presence. Work, an automatic function, but somehow not making sense.

Our family recently marked a difficult anniversary: the February date that my sister was found, the victim of suicide; and that same February date, exactly three years later that my infant grandson passed away in hospital. Those were days of raw emotion alternating with a welcome numbness.

We still grieve those losses, and I expect that we always will in the way that grief sometimes lurks around unexpected corners. But we mourned together, and healed together. Friends and community gathered closely around and offered tangible support and words of comfort. We weren’t required to make difficult or life altering decisions at a time when we wouldn’t have been capable of making best choices.

We felt – feel – grateful to friends and to community. It could have gone very differently, as it has for many.

Isolated in grief, unable to think clearly, life could have spiralled into a persistent and self-feeding depression. With the routine of work feeling like a burden and an energy drain, poor decisions may have been made about changing jobs. Or the decision to just go to work each day may have become overwhelming. In a short period of time the landlord would evict for lack of payment. The shame of the whole experience may prevent help being sought from friends, along with a glimmer of “I can do this myself, it’ll all work out.” And the result: homelessness.

Communities need places of refuge for those who have become homeless. They need to provide support to help individuals get past a trauma, whatever the cause, and to get their lives back on track. A safe place, with wise counsel.

And the vital piece of the solution: the caring friendship of others.